Introduction
Meesho is among the top-selling platform that offers you the freedom to open your own business online with zero investment and promote your products among millions of traffic. The Business model of Meesho involves its business plan, revenue model, its competitors, SWOT Analysis and many more.
The Meesho app started with just fashion and electronics to multiple fields and slowly and steadily expanded with varied categories.
The platform enables small businesses and individuals to launch online stores through social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram. The majority of Meesho resellers are Indian housewives who want to earn money or start their own business but have been unable to do so due to a lack of funds. Meesho provides these housewives with all of the tools, resources, and guidance they need to launch their own online business from the comfort of their own homes.
Business Plan
Meesho is a social e-commerce startup that helps customers get cheaper prices on products such as apparel, electronics, and jewelry. Over 70% of customers are from Tier 2/3+ cities. These customers are generally price-conscious, but they are willing to pay a premium for high-quality goods. Meesho simplified the entire product distribution process for the reseller.
Using Meesho, resellers can easily recommend products to their customers from their app’s crafted digital catalog. Also, this way, the resellers never run out of the products to sell.
When a buyer shows interest in any item, the resellers just need to enter the buyer’s address and add a margin, and the product is shipped from the seller’s place by Meesho’s logistic partners. This way, Meesho has dug a successful pathway for Indian people, especially housewives who want to make an extra income or start their business but lack the finances to kickstart.
The resellers or affiliates curate products that fit the taste and price preferences of their social resellers. The customer sees a highly personalized product, unlike traditional e-commerce where they go through overwhelming listings to discover relevant products.
Revenue model
The major source of income for Meesho is through Ads & Rank push. Meesho also allows its suppliers to run ads and showcase their products to a wider set of users.
- Meesho holds a good amount of user data a part of which it might sells to its partner companies. These partner companies can use this data to further understand user needs & motivation to grow their business.
- Meesho have tied up with multiple Logistics Partners for delivery fulfillment. Once a product is delivered, Meesho has potential to earn a small share of delivery charges passing on the rest to its delivery partners.
It started partnering with popular Youtube influencers from the Beauty and Lifestyle niche to promote the repository of products available that spread over 200 different categories. These influencers combined their videos by displaying products & exhibiting ease-of-use of the Meesho app to earn money by reselling products.
Competitors
Though Meesho is a first ever brand with such business plan, many other brand share also coming up with subsidiaries to capture the market share. Some of the competitors to Meesho are:
- Bulbul
- Simsim
- Citymall
- Glowroad
- Shopsy
- Dealshare
- Shop101
SWOT Analysis
Strengths
- Empowering Women Entrepreneurs: Meesho’s great strength is empowering Indian women to run their home-based businesses and build new businesses and identities for themselves.
- Easy to Become a Supplier: To become a Meesho supplier, you just need to download the Meesho app or open a website. Once you have selected the option “Become a Provider,” you will be directed to a short form to complete your details. Once your account is set up, you can start promoting your business and delivering orders straight away via Meesho.
- Start with Zero Investment: To join the hundreds of thousands of resellers who are making money through Meesho, you don’t have to invest any amount of money. All you’ll simply need is to establish a reseller account and begin reselling through Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram.
- Customer Loyalty Program: Meesho introduced VIP Membership to encourage its resellers. In this membership, if any resellers complete 15+ orders within 30 days, they’ll get an additional 10% discount on their products.
- Community Building: Meesho wants to grow as a community. That’s why they’ve launched a platform called Meesho Learning Hub, where resellers can learn to sell online and grow their business.
Weaknesses
- High distribution cost: The distribution costs hits hard on Meesho financials. Acquiring & retaining the users who are price conscious needs constant burning of cash. Furthermore, Meesho distribution climbed even higher than usual during COVID. The lockdown measures have seen consumers turning to fulfil essential items for home delivery which hampered the Meesho growth. Although, the Meesho team handles this situation well by selling masks, personal care, sanitisers, and grocery to the end-user.
- Inconsistent Product quality: During our research, multiple Meesho buyers mentioned degrading the quality of merchandise being delivered to them.
- Late delivery & slow customer service: Multiple customers told us that sometimes the products are not delivered on time. Once the product is delayed, customers gravitate towards “customer service” to know the status of their order.
Opportunities
- Augmented Reality: The use of Augmented Reality can allow customers to have real-time interaction with products while remaining in their environment. This can ultimately result in higher conversion rates and lower return rates for Meesho’s products.
- Crypto as A Payment Option: Shortly, crypto can become a common payment option for Meesho. This can result in a fast transaction of cash and a reduction in digital transaction frauds.
- Establishing in Other Countries: Meesho can slowly start to expand outside of India, which will help them increase their revenue.
- Increasing No of Users: Numbers of internet users are increasing day by day. People are feeling more comfortable shopping online. That is why it has an opportunity to gain lots of users shortly.
Threats
- Frauds & Scams: Many online fraud activities can be a matter of concern to customers visiting a website. If the website has false representation and duplicate products and neglected security, the website’s reach will be reduced and customers will no longer visit the website.
- Competitors: Meesho faces competition from brands like DealShare, GlowRoad, Shop101, etc. Meesho needs to ensure that its price, quality, and technology remain at the forefront of these companies.
- Data Concerns: Apart from the obvious fraud, there is a good chance that things will go wrong with online shopping especially when it comes to user data.
- No Direct Interaction: In Meesho there is no direct interaction between customer and reseller. There is no scope for negotiation. People prefer to buy physically as compared to the internet for personal experience.
Conclusion
Meesho Company can generate revenue in a variety of ways and profitably from them. Meesho is one of many Indian startups with a unique targeting and marketing strategy.
